High above the twirling planet earth, you don’t begrudge the film stars their vanity music projects, and it crosses your mind that the ventures may be pure of heart. After all, the man in the seat next to you says, they probably don’t need to do it for the pussy.

You hear him say this, talk this way, and it’s like a tape of you or someone you knew recorded a decade ago. The expression, coarse as it strikes you on the Jet Blue flight outside Columbus, is true.

But it doesn’t mean the music isn’t terrible.

And the film stars have relatives worse off than you and I, but you don’t see them at the film screenings and press junkets.

The other day, I saw this fuckin’ broad on TV, the man in the Jet Blue seat says, and she was interviewing one of these celebrities. The next night, she was being interviewed. He said, the chicks who interview the celebrities become celebrities. How fucked is that?

You think about it, and he makes sense again. Your mind drifts for a moment as you think about the observations that come wrapped in such salty phrases.

It’s true. We pay to watch millionaire teenagers run around in their shorts.

It’s weird – and distracting.

Like Mars and rockets and vanishing children and bickering politicians.

No one talks about the astronomical costs of health care, it dawns on you. Land of the free, my ass, the guy on the plane says. Free time maybe. Tell those terrorists they have it wrong. The United States advertises itself as the wealthiest nation in the world, but all that means is our rich people are richer than yours.